Chapter 83: Case Files

In the dimly lit inn room, four corpses were placed on the bed and couch, their death poses miserable and extremely hideous.

Chen Ji found it very difficult to connect this scene before his eyes with that forthright, even slightly foolish, prince.

If a person can disguise himself so thoroughly, then how terrifying is the face beneath this disguise?

Chen Ji instructed Xi Feng in a low voice: "Go ask the guests on the second floor if anyone heard sounds of fighting or wailing."

"Yes."

Xi Feng cupped his fist and left, leading several secret agents to knock door by door.

After a moment, Xi Feng returned and said in a low voice: "Sir, it's a bit strange, no one heard wailing. Could it be they were killed instantly after having their facial skin peeled off? So there was no time to wail."

Chen Ji did not answer, only bent down to carefully examine the corpses.

He pulled open the eyelids of the dead people and unexpectedly discovered that two copper nails were nailed into the pupils of each dead person. Beside the eyeballs, there was a patch of deep red.

After a moment, he stood up and said: "These four people had their facial skin peeled off while alive, were nailed with copper nails, and were tortured alive for a while."

Xi Feng was startled: "Peeled off facial skin while alive?"

Saying this, he took out a square handkerchief from his chest and handed it to Chen Ji: "Sir, wipe the bloodstains on your hands!"

Chen Ji wiped his hands while calmly analyzing: "If their facial skin was peeled off after death, not so much blood would have flowed from their faces, and their eyeballs would not have been so severely congested. It's strange, since they were tortured alive, why didn't they make any sound?"

In the strange quiet, the secret agents tightly gripped the handles of their waist knives.

Even these secret agents, who were accustomed to seeing scenes of killing, were involuntarily somewhat tense and solemn.

These four people didn't seem to have been killed by people, but rather as if their souls had been seized by ghosts.

Someone said in a low voice: "In the mountains in my hometown, there are face-eating women. Legend has it that they like to eat the faces of dead people and impersonate the dead to continue living."

Xi Feng let out a cold laugh and said with a solemn face: "As a secret agent, you actually discuss ghosts wildly? How could officials of our Ning Dynasty fear such filthy things?"

Someone quietly muttered: "Then could it be an official who used ghosts?"

Xi Feng kicked him: "It must be assassins who killed them to silence them."

Most people in this era were superstitious. All things that could not be explained could be attributed to ghosts and gods.

Even the secret agents who killed without blinking an eye believed in such things.

Chen Ji said calmly: "It wasn't ghosts! It was people! I'm searching for · the · Wonderful Taste Bookstore to see the complete version of Aoyama. The assassin's official path is very strange. They can control these people to suffer punishment while alive and yet be unable to struggle."

He didn't say that, according to criminal psychology profiling, the assassin should have also suffered similar physical and psychological severe damage. Only then would they develop twisted desires for abuse.

Chen Ji looked at Xi Feng: "The official paths are recorded in the Secret Agent Office. Which people can do such things?"

"Some sorcerers from the side door and left path might be able to do it!"

Xi Feng frowned and said: "Sir, this requires checking the case files library in the capital. And at least at the level of Hai Ying can enter the case files library area to see. This kind of official path is usually more hidden and rarely acts against the government. Our official status will greatly discount their 'techniques'."

"Oh?"

Chen Ji was surprised.

This was the second time he had heard this saying.

This time, Lin Chaoqing had said to Jiao Tu in Liu Shiyu's mansion: "This seat has a Da Ning fourth-rank official status, so don't take out mere small techniques to lose face."

That was when Chen Ji did not understand official paths. When he heard this sentence, he didn't take it to heart.

But now, combining Xi Feng's words, he suddenly realized one thing: Ning Dynasty official positions are themselves a kind of official path. The higher the official position, the less one needs to fear techniques.

Xi Feng looked at Chen Ji: "Sir, what do we do now? The clues are broken."

Chen Ji was silent and did not speak. Before, he had hoped for the clues to break. But now that the clues were truly broken, he didn't know whether he should be happy or worried.

Should he continue investigating? Or should he give up?

Xi Feng saw that he didn't answer, so he became doubtful and asked again: "Sir?"

Chen Ji turned and walked out of the room: "Take me to the inner prison case files library. I want to check a case file!"

He vaguely remembered that when he first helped Jiao Tu and Yun Yang investigate the Liu family case, he had glanced at files with similar punishment methods, but he didn't remember them clearly. He needed to look again.

In addition, he could take away some of the ice flow again.

Before leaving the door, Chen Ji suddenly added a sentence: "Put these four corpses into coffins and bury them. It must be done secretly, don't let the news leak."

Under the black night of Luoyi Street in the East Market, a carriage quietly stopped by the roadside. Tall, sturdy horses snorted in the cold wind, spraying out wave-like white mist.

Xi Feng stood behind Chen Ji, covering Chen Ji's eyes with a black cloth.

As he tied the black cloth, he explained: "Pardon me, sir, because I'm searching for · the · Wonderful Taste Bookstore to see the complete version of Aoyama. Luocheng Inner Prison was infiltrated earlier, and now the qualification to enter and exit the Inner Prison requires special approval from Lord Jin Zhu. Everyone else entering and exiting must be blindfolded."

"Understood!"

Chen Ji sat into the carriage with support.

When the wheels slowly rolled, he closed his eyes and asked: "How long have you followed Lord Jin Zhu?"

Xi Feng recalled: "Seven years!"

Chen Ji said "oh": "That's already a long time following Lord Jin Zhu. Do you often see Tian Ma?"

Xi Feng laughed: "Lord Tian Ma is like a dragon whose tail you don't see, making him hard for us to see. But during every Shangyuan Festival, Lord Jin Zhu rewards his subordinates with a wine banquet, and as long as he is in the capital, he will attend."

The spacious carriage swayed. Cold wind blew in through the gaps in the cotton cloth curtain from time to time.

Xi Feng took out a fire stick inside the carriage, carefully lit a copper hand warmer, and stuffed it into Chen Ji's arms: "Sir, warm your hands."

"Thank you!"

Chen Ji fumbled to take the copper hand warmer and asked again: "Have you seen Bai Long?"

Xi Feng closed the fire stick while saying: "Lord Bai Long is seen even less. His whereabouts are very mysterious, and he can only be seen on very important occasions. Lord Bai Long also wears a mask when he appears. Perhaps only Lord Neixiang knows what he looks like."

Chen Ji was silent for a moment: "What about Bing Hu?"

Xi Feng was startled: "I haven't seen Bing Hu. This lord is like a ghost, with no presence. Only when Lord Neixiang occasionally says 'this time, leave it to Bing Hu to handle,' everyone will remember that the Secret Agent Office still has such a figure."

"Never appeared?"

"Never appeared..."

Xi Feng carefully recalled: "At least since I entered the Secret Agent Office, I haven't seen him. Six years ago, when Wan Sui Ye traveled south, all the zodiac guards were at his left and right, but we still didn't see Bing Hu. It's also possible he was hiding in the crowd, but we didn't know."

Chen Ji asked: "What kind of things does Lord Neixiang generally assign Bing Hu to do? Is it assassination or intelligence gathering?"

Xi Feng looked at Chen Ji in surprise. He always felt that Chen Ji seemed particularly interested in Bing Hu: "Sir, have you also heard about Lord Bing Hu retiring? But this position is too far from us, and there are too many people fighting for it. Even with Lord Jin Zhu's help, it won't work."

The carriage arrived in front of the Inner Prison. Xi Feng got down first and supported Chen Ji as he walked down the narrow stairs into the Inner Prison.

After removing the blindfold, the flames of the Bagua array lamps on the walls on both sides of the stone path flickered.

The Inner Prison at night was even more gloomy, as if walking into hell.

"Sir, which files do you want to see?"

Xi Feng asked.

Chen Ji tried hard to recall the files he had seen: "Jianing seven years, Jia character files."

After the jailers carried over a large box, he quickly flipped through each page of the files, sweeping over ten lines at a glance.

Time passed minute by minute, second by second.

Chen Ji raised his head: "That's not right. Carry over the Jianing eight years, nine years Jia character files. Find them all together. As long as there are things nailed into dead bodies, find them all and give them to me."

He had looked at too many files before, only vaguely remembering similar cases, but he couldn't remember clearly which files they were in.

However, a jailer still said with difficulty: "Sir, we don't know characters."

"Don't know characters?"

Chen Ji was startled.

He knew that the literacy rate in this era was low, but he didn't expect that the jailers in the Secret Agent Office also didn't know characters.

Civil officials monopolized the paper and book industry and monopolized knowledge.

Ordinary families, not to mention participating in the imperial examinations, might not even find a way to become literate.

Xi Feng said: "Sir, I'll help you find them."

"Good!"

The two of them sat together in front of the oil lamp flipping through the files. The jailers boiled water for them and brewed strong tea until their eyes were sore. Xi Feng suddenly said: "Sir, is this what you're looking for? Jianing nine years, Kaifeng Fu Wu family extermination case."

Chen Ji took the files and saw that they recorded the case of the extermination of the Wu Zhuo family of seventeen people, the supervisor of the silver field in Kaifeng Fu, twelve years ago in one night. In the case, after the death of the Wu family's main wife, her mouth, nose, eyes, and ears were all nailed with wooden nails, the kind used in coffin shops to seal coffins.

Not only that, the Wu family's main wife also had her lower body cruelly cut off.

He looked carefully, but suddenly felt something was wrong: "The files record that the Wu family household should have been eighteen people, one still survived."

Xi Feng leaned over to look: "The silver field's... This is the people of our Directorate of Ceremonial twenty-four offices. Officials who can supervise the silver field all have connections to high places. There must be talented people above. It's a big fat job. But it's a bit strange, our Directorate of Ceremonial always protects its own people. Their own people were killed, and yet they didn't catch the assassin?"

Chen Ji thoughtfully: "Perhaps the assassin didn't leave any clues?"

"Even so, the files wouldn't be shelved and ignored."

Xi Feng explained: "The rules of our Directorate of Ceremonial are, even if the assassin is not caught that year, the files must be rechecked every year after to see if they can be 'combined with' other cases. As long as the assassin is not caught, we won't give up. But sir, look, these files are all at the bottom of the box..."

Chen Ji said lightly: "Unless the assassin is a big figure within the Directorate of Ceremonial."

Xi Feng was startled and subconsciously took a step back, distancing himself from the files.

Chen Ji was a little confused. The methods of the assassin in this case were extremely similar to those of tonight's assassin.

But if the assassin was really a big figure in the Directorate of Ceremonial, why would they help the prince kill people to silence them?